1. Technical Field
This disclosure relates to an image forming apparatus, and more specifically to an image forming apparatus having a carriage mounting a recording head for ejecting liquid droplets.
2. Description of the Related Art
Image forming apparatuses are used as printers, facsimile machines, copiers, plotters, or multi-functional devices having two or more of the foregoing capabilities. As one type of image forming apparatuses employing a liquid-ejection recording method, for example, inkjet recording apparatuses are known that use a recording head (liquid ejection head or liquid-droplet ejection head) for ejecting droplets of ink.
Such a liquid-ejection-type image forming apparatus may have a maintenance assembly (maintenance-and-recovery assembly) to maintain and recover the ejection stability of nozzles of the recording head. The maintenance assembly includes, for example, a suction cap to cap a nozzle face of the recording head for sucking and discharging liquid from the nozzles, a moisture retention cap to prevent drying of ink in the nozzles and intrusion of dust into the nozzles, and a wiper member (also referred to as wiper blade, wiping blade, or blade) to wipe and clean the nozzle face of the recording head. The maintenance assembly performs, for example, recovery operation to form nozzle menisci by wiping the nozzle face with the wiping member after viscosity-increased ink is discharged from the nozzles to the suction cap.
As a conventional type of maintenance assembly, for example, JP-3930587-B1 (JP-09-300644-A) proposes a maintenance assembly movable in a sub-scanning direction perpendicular to a main scanning direction between a maintenance position at which the maintenance assembly opposes recording heads mounted on the carriage to perform maintenance and recovery operation and a retracted position at which the maintenance assembly does not oppose the recording heads.
To enhance the productivity of, e.g., an image forming apparatus, a plurality of recording heads for ejecting the same color of liquid droplets may be displaced in a staggered manner in the sub-scanning direction to increase a print width printable in the sub-scanning direction by a single main scanning. As a maintenance assembly of the image forming apparatus, multiple maintenance units are arranged at such positions that the respective recording heads displaced in the sub-scanning direction can oppose the corresponding maintenance units.
Such a configuration increases the number of components and space in the main scanning direction of the maintenance assembly, thus increasing the width (apparatus size in the main scanning direction) of the image forming apparatus.